Condos

Frank Gehry and David Mirvish bring fresh drama to Toronto

It would stand to reason that a neighbourhood dubbed "the Entertainment District" would be full of interesting and entertaining things to do. There would be a steady stream of people on the sidewalks, with residents and tourists mingling at restaurants, visiting art galleries and going shopping. The area would feel alive.

In recent years, however, Toronto's Entertainment District - which is bordered by Queen, Simcoe, King and John streets - has been a wasteland of shuttered storefronts, overpriced parking lots, older bistros, loud and overcrowded dance clubs and the odd bout of gang violence.

Save for cultural places such as the National Film Board of Canada, TIFF, Roy Thomson Hall and the Princess of Wales Theatre, it's become an area many Torontonians actively avoid (except en route to work), and it's definitely not an area tourists come to the city to visit.

But the Entertainment District hasn't always been this way, says theatre and art impresario David Mirvish. And the community doesn't have to face the same languishing fate in the future.

"We have a ton of people who live downtown who have never come to this neighbourhood. It's important to hold tourists in an area, too. People want to be near [amenities]."

To that end, Mr. Mirvish recently announced plans to transform a gigantic stretch of this once heavily trafficked neighbourhood with the help of world-renowned, Toronto-born architect Frank Gehry (he's behind the Art Gallery of Ontario's revitalization). The idea is to build a focal point for Toronto's downtown core, starting with three 80-plusstorey condominium towers.

Ranging from bachelors to units with a few bedrooms, the buildings will offer residents all of the amenities a regular tower would with one major addition: At the base of the condos, which resemble square blocks stacked atop one another, there would be an active, six-storey arts and cultural centre. The hub would house a new 60,000square-foot gallery, a campus for OCAD University as well as retail and restaurant space. It may even house a grocery store - something currently missing in the neighbourhood.

If approved by city council, it will be a game-changer for the area and all of Toronto. Nothing like it exists anywhere in Canada.

"This area's really in transition and continues to grow," says Peter Kofman, president of Projectcore, which is working on the project with Mr. Mirvish and Mr. Gehry. "What's interesting about this development compared to others is we tried to do more than just great architecture," Mr. Kofman says. "We're trying to transition from what the neighbourhood was to what it can be."

Of course, as with any large project, this one has drawn the ire of community activists, largely because the complex will be housed on the strip of street occupied by the Princess of Wales Theatre. To ac-comodate the new towers, the building would have to be demolished.

The theatre was built in the '90s at a time when Mr. Mirvish's late father, Ed, was attempting to turn the derelict neighbourhood into a thriving cultural hub.

Though Mr. Mirvish says he tried to make the theatre fit into the development's plans, and that it will be hard to tear down, he realizes "keeping the theatre won't give the area the animation we want. We want to make this a destination that's worthwhile again. We want to be in the centre of it all and doing something that's alive every minute of the day, not just the half hour before a show and the half hour after."

Mr. Kofman adds that he, Mr. Mirvish and Mr. Gehry are actively working with community members and businesses such as TIFF to ensure the development benefits everyone in the neighbourhood.

"We can't say we're one development in the Entertainment District, we're part of the fabric. We're not an island," Mr. Kofman says. "We have to mix within the context of everything - this could be transformative not just for King Street, but for everything."

Outside of the general look of the building, and the amenities that could be housed at the base of the towers, not much about the project can be confirmed. "We're explaining all of this at a time when we're still developing our ideas to come up with the best possible ones for the community. It's a work in progress," Mr. Mirvish says.

Still, one thing is certain: "We were teenagers and now we're young adults as a city. It's important to have a place [like this] that's the centre of cultural life. It distinguishes one city from another."

Mr. Kofman adds: "Having people on the street and interacting with each other and the building will be a great thing."

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